It's a goofy tourist thing to do, to ride the hated Conch Tour Train around Key West. Very uncool, exceedingly unsuave. But like so many things the hipsters reject it is also exceeding good fun.
Entertaining, certainly but also surprisingly informative, and the price is right in June when locals ride free, which is a deal as adults pay $29 for a 90 minute tour, hop on, hop off, at several stops around town.
We joined the train at Caroline and Margaret kitty corner from Harpoon Harry's diner. And then the ride began, alongside the famous Key West Bight...
...and the driver talks for ninety minutes solid, with two mysterious quiet zones which the boys and I speculated were bought for by wealthy pissed off residents who get tired of listening to the same spiel every day a dozen times a day rolling past their doors.
The train rolls to Front Street, pauses for the punters to get off and buy some mass produced dust catchers and then hop on the next train down famous Whitehead Street, zipping past Key West's only covered shopping maul. This was called building number one, because it was...
...the first building constructed on key West's harbor water front. The drivers are working for tips and don't forget that and they work hard, talking joking and repeating the spiel laid down for them word for word by the strictly run Historic Tours.
Locals hate the trains. They are loud and slow and block the narrow streets while rolling along barely above walking pace. The drivers are quick to point out over their speaker system that state law forbids them from stopping, thank God for small mercies, but the trains never run traffic lights and are quite slow to take off from a red light.
Trying to get to work?
Too bad. We have monuments to visit and roll past, slowly but inexorably.
As the train winds its way around Old Town you will see them all,
and the drivers will spill all sorts of tidbits and curious information about "our" history, stuff that your average tourist on a rental bike will never learn on their own.
Anyone who reads my blog knows I am very fond of history; history is my guide, and there is a ton of it spewed out across the Conch Train.
It rolls past you and over you and across you for an hour and a half.
Hemingway House? There it went...Sandy Cornish's African methodist Episcopal Church on Whitehead? Yup, and that was the window known as the "Eye of God." Who knew?
The Conch Train is an excellent people watching platform because you are a tourist and thus invisible. 
Key West zooms by and if you thought you knew the town, you'll learn more. if you want to know thew town, follow along on a map and plan a proper explore on foot, bicycle or scooter, later.
And did I mention tip like a local, please?
And if you want a tour of Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas---they got that!
Yeah,, the train is noisy and slow and blocks traffic and it's cheesy, but...
They have a point.
I hadn't done it in years and doubt I shall again, but I should do it every June and remind myself of how much fun it is to be a Key West visitor.http://www.conchtourtrain.com/index.htm
And for ten bucks less you can ride the competing trolley service put on by City Views, which is owned by Ed Swift's ex-son-in-law who used to work with the Conch Train people and decided to come back to town and open a competing service. Peyton Place ain't in it. They have been sparring publicly and privately over stops, hiring practices and their latest spat over membership in the tour operators association. Whatever.
One ride or the other will be fun and I think they are worthwhile to get an overview of the city.
5 comments:
I live in Key West.
I'm on the tour route.
I like the trains.
They're mobile speed bumps, and a reminder we don't live in Anytown, USA.
"And on your right, in the driveway behind the white picket fence, is a Gumbo-Limbo Tree. Some people call it the Tourist Tree, as it's bark is red and peeling."
-Conch Tour Train narrative excerpt.
I don't like following them and I'd hate to hear them all the time, I used to work on their route so I know that noise, but I like riding them from time to time.
It's actually kind of fun to be on a motorcycle behind the train - you get to stare at the tourists like, well...a tourist!
It creeps them out, and I snicker at the irony.
Easily amused,
Chuck.
The tour train was modeled after the one in Helena Montana and I believe owned by the same person. I understand the frustration of getting behind a slow train. Especially as it makes it up and down the hills of Helena. It only runs in the Summer months here though.
Bob from Livingston Montana who lives in Helena.
I think they do them in dc and baltimore and somewhere like charleston. I even saw a conch train lookalike in corsica which was rather a surprise.
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